World Championship 2021 snooker - Ronnie O'Sullivan hits back at Mark Selby 'disrespect' accusation
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Updated 15/04/2021 at 12:28 GMT
Reigning world champion Ronnie O'Sullivan has questioned whether his great rival Mark Selby will ever be able to "get over" the semi-final defeat he suffered at the Rocket's hands at the Crucible in 2020. O'Sullivan edged out Selby in a famously dramatic clash in Sheffield, en route to clinching his sixth world title with victory in the final over Kyren Wilson.
'He might never recover from it' - O'Sullivan responds to Selby over 'disrespect'
Ronnie O'Sullivan has responded to Mark Selby reasserting that it was "disrespectful" of him to smash balls during their 2020 World Championship semi-final.
O'Sullivan roared back in legendary fashion to defeat the Jester from Leicester 17-16 in a true classic at the Crucible last year, which was also notably controversial.
Selby objected to the Rocket smashing balls seemingly aimlessly, and he made his feelings very clear at the time in the wake of his painful loss.
The three-time world champion - speaking exclusively with Eurosport for a special documentary which airs at 7pm UK time on April 16, called 'One Day at The Crucible' - reiterated his feelings about his rival's play in the match.
O'Sullivan will face Mark Joyce in the first round after the World Championship draw was made on Thursday morning.
"Yeah I definitely feel in that particular match, especially towards the end of the last session when he was smashing the balls around [O'Sullivan was being disrespectful]," Selby explained.
"Because playing any other player... if that was John Higgins, he would have just tried to get out of the shot and play the right shots.
"I felt as though Ronnie was obviously doing that [smashing the balls], and if you are doing that you don't deserve to not only win the match, but you don't deserve to not stick balls on.
"He was sort of smashing them and getting away with it and not leaving me anything.
Obviously at that point, only in that match, I felt as though he was disrespectful to me and the game at that particular time.
"In other matches when I've played him he has not been like that, it was just that one particular match when I felt it was just disrespectful."
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'An absolutely ridiculous shot' - Ronnie O'Sullivan smashes cue ball
O'Sullivan responded in somewhat frosty fashion and questioned whether Selby would ever be able to "get over" his defeat in the classic match.
"I just think that he is obviously just picking one or two shots out of 33 frames, and he has done that to a lot of players over the years," O'Sullivan retorted.
"He has turned matches into maybe not such good spectacles, but just does enough to get a result. Some people would look at that and go, 'Well that's probably not in the spirit of the game.'
"I played one shot but there were 33 frames, and three brilliant frames towards the end of the match. I'd rather focus on that.
Maybe that's the sort of match that he might never recover from, because I just think in some ways he thought that was his tournament and if he'd have beaten me he'd have probably gone on to win the final.
"Even if he does go on and win another one or two world titles - which is no guarantee because Judd [Trump] and Neil Robertson are about - maybe that would have been his last chance of winning a world final.
"So... will he ever get over that one? I don't know. That's probably a tough one to take."
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Mark Selby on Ronnie O'Sullivan: 'I felt it was disrespectful to me and the game'
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Watch 'One Day at The Crucible' at 7pm UK time on Friday 16th April on Eurosport 1, eurosport.co.uk and the Eurosport app.
You can watch every match of the World Championship live and ad-free on the Eurosport App and eurosport.co.uk. Download the Eurosport app now for iOS and Android.
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